Dancing in Dream Land

Getting children aged 5-7 years old to engage with art can be a challenge, so I decided to turn the experience into an adventure. The Dancing in Dream Land workshop guided children through a journey in which they explored the artwork in the Elizabeth Price exhibition.

Focusing solely on the Sleeping section of the exhibition, the children considered states of sleeping, consciousness and dreaming through dance and movement. Spending part of the workshop in the gallery, the children were asked to identify sleeping figures and take on their shapes, exploring the different positions that we can sleep in. We studied an excerpt from Charles Laughton’s film, The Night of the Hunter (1955), noting the dreamlike scenarios and imagery.

Back in the studio, we began our journey into dreamland based on Laughton’s imagery and the children’s own imaginations. We ventured through a river made of lemonade, a field with grass so tall it touched the clouds, we were trapped in a spider’s web, and finally were carried back to our beds on giant butterflies.

In each section of dreamland, the children considered how their bodies moved and changed. Our arms became the long grass, we floated into the clouds and we struggled and wriggled free of the giant spider’s web. Through moving, shaking and burning off some half-term energy the children engaged with some of the themes and concepts in the Price exhibition, and we had a lot of fun in the process!

By choreographer Emily Robertson